


Out of My League

by sleepless_raccoon



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: #girlsnight, Eavesdropping, F/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-21
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2018-08-16 12:15:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8102074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepless_raccoon/pseuds/sleepless_raccoon
Summary: Steve overhears a conversation between Darcy and Jane on Girl's Night





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, it's two in the morning, which seems like a great time for making stupid decisions, like posting my first ever fanfic. We'll see. Regret may happen tomorrow after I've slept. For now, this is it.

Steve would have denied it until he turned blue in the face (except he didn’t really do that, not anymore, not since the serum cured his asthma), but he was eavesdropping. It was easy, with his enhanced hearing, to pick out the sound of his name from behind the closed door, and when he realized one of the voices belonged to Darcy…well, he was only a man, after all. His every interaction with the charismatic lab assistant had left him feeling as tongue tied and awkward as he’d ever been with dames back before the USO tour, and while she seemed friendly with everyone, she mostly kept her social interactions to Jane and Thor, sometimes Bruce and Tony or, weirdly enough, Clint. Steve was running out of excuses to hang around the astrophysicist’s lab, and he’d barely exchanged more than pleasantries with Darcy herself.

“So when are you going to let Thor convince you to join in on an Avenger’s night? Movie, family style dinner, outing? Captain America attends pretty much everything as long as he’s here in the tower.”

“Umm, I am not an Avenger, so never? I’m happy in my bubble, Jane, leave me alone.”

Steve had stopped and backtracked at these words, standing in the hall outside Thor’s apartment and hoping no one would catch him loitering. He had no idea what he’d say in his defense.

“Darcy, how are you ever going to do anything about that hopeless crush if you refuse to even talk to the guy?”

Crush?

*******

Darcy scoffed. “The whole point of a hopeless crush, Jane, is that it’s hopeless. He’s miles out of my league.” She took a sip of her wine. Okay, maybe it was a big sip, but it was absolutely not a gulp. She was an effing lady, she sipped her wine, gorramit.

“What?! You’re gorgeous!” Jane said, waving her own glass for emphasis. “And have you seen pictures of him from before the serum? He probably would have thought the same thing about you, back in the day.”

“Firstly, hell yeah I’m gorgeous!” Darcy said. Jane smiled and offered her hand for a high five, which Darcy slapped with enthusiasm. Her grin faded though as she continued, “But I don’t mean that he’s out of my league physically, I mean he’s out of my league…as a person. He’s like, so honorable and sincere and kind and…he’s just, a really great man, Janey. Like, they literally gave him the serum because he was such a decent guy. Short, tall, buff, or not – he was out of my league back when we were the same height and I woulda had the kind of figure women actually wanted.”

Jane frowned, but before she could make a retort, Darcy continued. “I read this biography of him that had all of Dr. Erskine’s notes and quotes from people that worked on the project, and basically the serum had to go to a guy with a good heart, cause if he was a dick then he’d turn out even worse – like, the serum was supposed to exaggerate everything, including personality traits. So everything about Steve Rogers got amplified when they made him into Captain America, and I’m not Peggy freaking Carter, or Mother Teresa, so please, Janey, just drop it. He’s out of my league. I once stole a pack of gum in middle school.”

Jane raised her eyebrows.

“Okay, actually it was lipstick, and it was twice, not once,” Darcy admitted. “Jeez! You see why I don’t have a chance with the guy?”

Jane sipped her wine. Actually sipped, not gulp-sipped, like Darcy. Which she totally did not do again, nope.

This was why she had no chance with Steve. She was not an effing lady. She was a loud, brash, thoroughly modern girl with no old fashioned manners or poise, and certainly no aura of old Hollywood glamour and badassery like his first love.

She maybe gulped her wine again. Time for a refill.

Jane was just sitting there, watching her, waiting for anther outburst. The Jane method of interrogation might not have worked for an actual spy like Black Widow, but it was effective against her best friend. Step one: provide booze. Step two: introduce subject. Step three: wait. Silently. Provide more booze as needed and repeat.

Darcy cracked every time.

“Stop looking at me like that!” she wailed. “I don’t even know what you want me to say!”

Jane smiled and took another drink before responding. “It’s girl’s night, Darcy – I just thought we’d drink our wine and talk about boys.”

“Well, I don’t have a boy,” Darcy grumped. “And I don’t wanna talk anymore about Steve.”

“I still think you should give him a chance,” Jane said. “At least hold a conversation with the man before you reject him. Thor thinks…we think he might be lonely.”  
Darcy snorted and rolled her eyes. “Jane, he’s surrounded by people that adore him. His teammates are basically a super scary family, they would all kill for each other. And like I said, he’s out of my league. He should end up with one of the model-beautiful do-gooders that go to Stark’s parties, a classy non-celibate Mother Teresa type. There’s never a shortage of them hanging on to his every word.”

“Wow,” said Jane, “you’re not bitter at all, huh?”

“I’m not bitter, I’m pining! You gave me wine and started this talk! I can’t help it if I’m in love with his stupid face!”

“Well, I’m regretting it – and you’re not even in love with his face, god Darcy, you’re in love with his freaking personality! I need more wine for this level of cliché.” She topped off both their glasses and lightly tapped them together in a toast before gulping – yep, Jane was finally ready to DRINK – half the glass. Darcy followed suit and then settled into a pout.

“I think it’s your turn,” she said, fully aware of how sullen her tone was. “Wanna talk about Thor, or complain about Tony?”

Jane shook her head. “You know, no one is perfect, Darcy.”

“Yes, Janey, I do know that. Steve’s not a saint – according to some of the stories Natasha has told, far from it. No one’s perfect, and it’s not like I’m idolizing him or anything…it’s just…I don’t know. Even when he’s making fun, there’s never any malice behind it, you know? He’s dry and funny and sweet and I’ve had too much to drink to talk about this anymore without crying – and no one likes a weepy drunk. Let’s watch something funny.”  
They moved on to the snacks and movie watching portion of the evening.

********

“Thor thinks…we think he might be lonely.”

Steve frowned. Did he seem lonely? He was lonely, if he stopped to think about it long enough, but he thought that he’d hidden it pretty well, socializing and getting to know his fellow Avengers. Natasha he considered a friend, and Sam, and maybe even Tony, while Thor was so boisterous and welcoming it was hard not to like him and feel at ease in his presence – when he was around. Yet…Bucky was still out in the world somewhere, hiding from HYDRA and from Steve, and Peggy’s memory was failing badly. The truth was, Steve missed having anyone in his life that really knew him – knew and appreciated the real him, the skinny guy from Brooklyn too dumb to run away from a fight, with a sly sense of humor and a mouth louder than his asthmatic chest should’ve allowed.  
His frown deepened when he heard Darcy’s response. Did she think he enjoyed the attention of those women? That he sought it out? Welcomed it? Didn’t she realize how insincere so many of them were?  
Then he heard Darcy say “in love with his stupid face,” and it was like all the air got sucked from his lungs, and there wasn’t a cure for this, no inhalation of steam or drugs that could restore his breath.  
Was it really possible that Darcy, beautiful, witty, friendly Darcy, was as stupid over him as he was over her? And, if so, what was he going to do about it?


	2. Chatper Two: the morning after

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote more. There will probably be yet more after this.

Steve sat in his apartment staring at an unremarkable spot on the wall, contemplating his options in the face of the new information his morally questionable afternoon’s spying had netted. Darcy Lewis was “in love with his stupid face” – or rather, as Jane had said, his “freaking personality.” Which was wonderful news considering that Steve was in love likewise with both Darcy’s gorgeous face and her vibrant personality. He’d been carefully disguising his growing admiration and affection ever since they’d met a few months earlier when she’d moved to the tower with Jane. Their contact was limited, but Steve wasn’t blind; Darcy was exactly his type. Bold and unapologetic, with curves like a pin-up girl from his own time and a smile that brightened the day of anyone she bestowed it on, it hadn’t taken him long at all to develop a crush on the little brunette.

And it wasn’t unrequited. Despite Darcy being so far out of his league that he would’ve been crazy to pursue her, despite the fact that she paid him no special attention, despite the way he seemed incapable of speaking more than a few barely coherent sentences at a time whenever he was in her presence, Darcy had a crush of her own.

On him.

And she thought he was indifferent. She thought that it was Steve who was out of Darcy’s league. It was laughable – or it would have been, if it hadn’t been true. It was going to take him some time to process this development, to formulate a response to her conviction that Steve was beyond her. He wasn’t sure if it stemmed from a place of insecurity regarding her own worth and desirability, or if it had more to do with her perception of him. Hearing Darcy’s opinion of him had simultaneously made Steve feel like he could have burst all his buttons even in his pre-serum body when every shirt was too big for him, and like a giant fraud. The dichotomy of pride and humility she inspired in him was reminiscent of the way Peggy and Dr. Erksine used to make him feel: gratified for their faith in him and eager to live up to it, to deserve that faith.

How to approach her? What could he say to convince her that he was desperate for a chance at – something – with her? Worse, how to get her alone so that he could make the attempt? He’d never seen her without Jane or Thor, or worse, Tony, at her side. He didn’t like the idea of having an audience for the conversation; even knowing she was interested, it was sure to be awkward. He would be awkward. Memories of his early interactions with Peggy, and with Darcy herself, were proof enough of that.

Then again, those same memories were proof that it would be well worth it. And he had the feeling that even Peggy would approve of Darcy. Though he wasn’t sure the world would survive that introduction…

 

Darcy woke the morning after their Ladies Night with a headache far less pounding and photosensitive than she’d anticipated. Turns out, lamenting her unrequited love crush was enough of a depressant that it lowered her consumption of alcohol. Huh.

“Freakin’ Steve Rogers, he’s a good influence even when he’s not around,” she muttered into her pillow. It was unsympathetic to her complaining and her hangover alike, as were her alarm clock and the half-open blinds on her bedroom window. See if she forgot to close those before a night of wine and whine ever again. With a groan, she pulled herself out of bed and turned off the alarm on her phone, shuffling to the bathroom to take stock of the damage and tame the wild beast that was her hair before pulling on her most comfortable jeans and sweater for a day in the lab collating data. Thankfully her boss was the understanding sort – and probably even more hung over than Darcy herself, considering Jane’s intolerance for alcohol.

She chugged a water bottle with some aspirin and microwaved a hot pocket for breakfast, then stuffed a package of pop tarts into her bag for later. Jane would come stumbling in at some point, and when Thor was in the tower she wouldn’t come down without eating and drinking something first, since her alien boyfriend was even more of a feeder than Darcy.

Once in the lab, Darcy was settling in to a rhythm, transcribing Jane’s notes from their last field trip, when the lab door whooshed open.

“Boss lady, glad you’re not dead,” she greeted her friend.

A deep, masculine, definitely not Jane voice chuckled and answered, “Not dead, no, and also not a lady.”

Darcy meeped and scooted her chair out from behind her desk to see Steve standing inside the lab, making his way steadily towards her. She stood up when he reached her chair, since their height difference was already pretty steep without her sitting down.

“Hey, Steve,” she said, blaming the hangover for the croaky quality of her voice. “What brings you down here to the lab?”

He took one step more than she was expecting him to, and yup, he was definitely crowding her space. Darcy couldn’t back up without sitting down, but her hungover, unrequited self was not feeling equal to such close proximity either.

Some of her distress must have displayed itself on her face, because Steve’s intent expression changed to one of concern. Gorammit, wasn’t there anything he didn’t look good doing? His face was a completely unfair work of art. Darcy was not sober enough to handle this.

Oh fudge, he was talking.

“…okay?”

She could probably extrapolate his meaning from just that, thank god. “Yeah, I’m fine,” she assured him. “Just had a little too much wine with Jane last night. Girl’s night, you know. Nothing bad. Just…hungover,” she finished lamely.

He nodded, and while he didn’t look so concerned, the intensity of his gaze didn’t abate. “That’s good,” he said. “Did you have fun at least?”

She managed a smile and nodded. “We always do, and somehow I never remember how much I hate to be hungover the next day when we open the second bottle,” she explained.

He grinned. “Bucky and I used to do the same thing; any time we could afford a bottle, we usually drank the whole thing in one night.”

Darcy grinned. “I’m guessing not wine?” she asked.

He laughed, but not as loudly as he probably would have if she hadn’t admitted to being hung over. The guy was too thoughtful, it was disgusting. “No, not wine,” he confirmed. He just stood there, a little too close to her, staring with a fond expression on his face as he remembered times spent with his best friend. Darcy thought about what it would be like to wake up seventy years in the future, when everyone she knew and loved was dead or old and forgetful and dying, and wanted to give him a hug.

They weren’t really hugging friends, though, so she held back. “It’s good that you have so many happy memories of him,” she said instead, and instantly wanted to sew her mouth shut when she saw the tightening at the corners of his eyes and mouth.

“Shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you sad,” she said. Then, “Fuck, I just swore in front of Captain America. Oh god.” Darcy hid her face behind her hands and groaned. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled miserably. “In my defense, please remember I drank too much wine last night.”

Somehow saying that out loud made her feel even worse, like she needed to clarify that she wasn’t usually this drunken idiot who stomped all over people’s delicate feelings with her loud mouth and complete lack of brain to mouth filter. Well, okay, she actually pretty much was just like this, all the time, without the hangover excuse.

Darcy was a terrible person, was basically the conclusion of the morning. And it was just her luck to show all of the terrible to Steve, who was without a doubt the best person she knew.

She should have stayed in bed this morning. Responsibility was overrated. Even Jane wasn’t in the lab yet, and no one could match Jane for stubborn passion when it came to her work. And god, where was Jane? Why wasn’t she in the lab yet, rescuing Darcy from her own awkward stupidity?

Before she could think of anything to say that would make the awkward less…awkward, Steve’s phone rang. Loudly. Darcy winced, and he silenced it. “Sorry,” he said. He didn’t even look at the screen to see who it was until the phone started buzzing again, and then he winced. “I, uh, I need to answer this,” he said. “Sorry.” He turned and held the phone to his ear and said, “Rogers. What’s up, Sam?”

Darcy watched him leave with a sense of mingled relief and despair. At least he was out of range of her terrible hangover and the complete lack of filter it inspired, yet…Darcy was pretty sure that after that train wreck of a conversation, Steve was never going to want to be anywhere near him ever again. Great. Just what her fragile sense of self-worth and giant crush needed.

With a sigh, Darcy turned back to her work.

 

Steve listened to Sam’s intel (fresh, definitive ID, be there in five hours by quinjet) with only most of his attention. The rest of it was still focused on the beautiful woman he’d left back in the lab, hoping she wasn’t too angry with his abrupt exit. He’d been curt and rude, he knew, and hoped that an explanation and sincere apology the next time he saw her would be enough to convince her to go out with him. Really, he thought as he grabbed his already packed duffel “go” bag, it was probably better that he hadn’t made it to that part of his speech when Sam had called. Nothing like asking out the woman of your dreams (literal, very steamy, dreams) and leaving before she had a chance to answer.

Steve would just have to be extra convincing when he did finally ask her out.


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear I'm trying to wrap this up, but they are such awkward bunnies!

The mission was not quick. It was not easy. And it did not end with Steve bringing Bucky home.

It was, in fact, perhaps the worst mission Steve had been on yet, if you didn’t count the time Bucky tried to kill him. Well, times, technically, but since one of those times Bucky had also saved his life, Steve figured it all evened out.

This mission…well, at least they had found Bucky. Just in time for him to spook and take off again, leaving behind a strongly worded message telling Steve to back off, not to look for him, to give him time…basically, a letter that broke Steve’s heart and pissed him off in equal measure. What kind of brother just abandoned his family member to recover from something as horrific as what Hydra had put Bucky through alone? The letter proved that Bucky remembered him, at least a little; why wouldn’t he want Steve’s support while he put himself back together? And maybe some backup when he blew up his next Hydra base?

Steve would have felt strongly tempted to punch Sam for using the word “brood” to describe what he’d done the whole ride home to the training facility, but he knew he’d been lousy company. Of course, Sam had fallen asleep as soon as they reached cruising altitude. And if nothing else, at least his misery over Bucky had distracted him from his failure and misery over Darcy.

Steve needed new pick-me-up tactics.

 

 

Darcy heard that Steve was back, and that once again, he’d returned without his best friend, and decided that it was an appropriate, platonic, friendly thing to do to try to cheer him up. Plus it was practically a public service; the sad puppy eyes of freedom were a hazard to all exposed to them. If she could make Steve smile? Well, at least that was only hazardous to her own heart.

Darcy decided that everyone liked treats, and she knew from Jane’s not at all subtle teasing that Steve especially like things that were homemade. He preferred them over goodies that were store bought, because of all the processed and refined sugars in modern food, but he loved desserts of all kinds, because he’d been too poor and too rationed growing up to afford very many sweets. She poked around the internet until she found a recipe for a “Great Depression Cake” and found a popular one on several websites that was made without eggs, but did use coffee. Aside from the boring name, it was official; this was Darcy’s perfect cake. She only burned the first one. The middle part that didn’t cook right tasted pretty great, though, so she tried again, and it looked delicious, perfectly cooked evenly across the top without any weird soggy spots or dry edges. She packaged it up and attached a little note, then left it outside his door and asked Jarvis to alert him to the gift.

Then she tried to pretend she wasn’t waiting to see if he would acknowledge her offering, burying herself in paperwork and data processing down in Jane’s lab for the rest of the day.

 

 

Steve indulged in a long, hot shower when they got back, and after that decided he still wasn’t ready to see everyone, so he took a nap. He woke just as the sun was setting, to a message from Jarvis that Darcy had left him a gift outside his door.

It was a home baked cake. He picked it up and read the little note attached and smiled.

Heard it wasn’t a great mission. So sorry. Hope this helps 

If Steve hadn’t already been stupid for her, this might have pushed him over the edge. It was so quintessentially Darcy – thoughtful, personal, sweet…in more ways than one, he thought, as he took a bite of the cake and closed his eyes in pleasure. It tasted vaguely like something his mother might have baked, and it touched the place in his heart that ached for Bucky, for his own time, for everything that he’d lost, and soothed it.

He set the rest of the cake on the counter. No more waiting; Bucky didn’t want to come home, not yet, and he would respect Bucky’s decision and let him find Steve when he was ready. But Darcy was here, and Darcy was ready…he hoped. She’d sounded like she wouldn’t turn him down for a night out on the town, when he’d eavesdropped that night that felt so long ago.

“Jarvis, where is Darcy now?” he asked.

“Miss Lewis is in Lab #38, Captain Rogers,” the computerized British voice said.

“Thank you, Jarvis,” Steve replied. It felt rude not to interact with Jarvis as though he was a real person, and good manners were ingrained in Steve.

“My pleasure, Captain Rogers,” Jarvis said.

Steve snuck one more bite of the cake before leave his rooms for the elevator. He fidgeted the whole ride down to the lab floor, wondering if she would be alone, determined to talk to her even if she wasn’t.

He just really hoped Tony wasn’t in lab 38. He should have asked Jarvis.

 

 

Tony wasn’t in the lab, but Darcy didn’t appear to be in the lab either. Steve had called her name when he walked in, with no answer. The lights were on, and her computer was running at least one program, but Jane and Darcy were both absent.

Steve spent several minutes trying to locate a piece of paper to write her a note, then dug through the detritus on her desk for a pen. Then he realized he had no idea what to say in a written note, since everything he’d rehearsed had been meant for face to face interaction. He sighed.

Finally he simply wrote “Thanks for the cake, it was delicious,” and left it on her keyboard. It felt too creepy to wait around hoping she’d show up. Just as he was leaving, however, Darcy appeared in the hall, just in time for him to smack her with the door.

“Shit! I’m so sorry!” he exclaimed, his hands hovering near her face but not settling on any one point. Did they have ice in the labs? Surely they must have ice and paper towels somewhere, right?

“Language, Cap,” she said, wincing and holding her forehead.

“Shit,” he said again, “I’m so sorry. Do you guys have ice anywhere?”

She pointed to the far corner of the room where he could see a mini fridge, and ran to grab some ice and wrap it up in paper towels, then ran back to press it to her face where he’d struck her with the door.

“This isn’t usually how I say ‘thank you,’” he told her, wincing in sympathy at the lump that was rising. He’d suffered his share of bruises and bumps growing up, but at least he’d deserved them, picking fights and never backing down. Poor Darcy just had the misfortune to be in his general vicinity.

“Thank you?” she asked.

“Yeah, for the cake you left me,” he said. “It was delicious, and perfect, and tasted like something my ma woulda made.”

She colored. “I’m glad,” she said. “You’re very welcome. I’m sorry about…you know, Bucky.”

“Yeah,” Steve said, and then found he didn’t know how to segue away from that sensitive topic to the more immediate one of ‘hey, Darcy, I’m dead gone on you; wanna get dinner?’ without making it even more awkward than it had already become.

They were terrible at this, Steve decided. He was terrible at this. And he felt that the odds of a woman agreeing to a dinner date were not in favor of the guy who’d just smashed her face in with a heavy door.

Perhaps a strategic retreat was in order.

“I’m really very, very sorry, Darcy,” he said. “I just wanted to come down and thank you in person. It meant a lot to me.”

She smiled from behind her icepack. “You’re welcome, Steve. I’m glad I could help.”

They sat just smiling at each other until Steve realized he was probably making things weird, and rubbed his hands on his thighs. “Well, I guess I should let you get back to work,” he said.

Darcy shrugged noncommittally and said nothing as he stood. She accepted his hand and let him help her to her feet, then headed for her work station. “See you at breakfast tomorrow?” she asked.

Steve nodded and backed away towards the door. “Yeah, I’ll be there. See you tomorrow, Darcy,” he said, and checked the hall before opening the door and leaving.


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In my defense, only the first chapter was ever supposed to be posted. And then I kept going. And then I stopped for a long time. And now finally this.

Okay, Steve thought, thus far he’d made a fool of himself and been rude and bruised the face of the woman he wanted to woo, so there really wasn’t any humiliation left to him except to lay his heart bare and hope she’d still give him a chance. Tomorrow. He would definitely ask her tomorrow. Maybe he could offer to walk her down to the lab from the communal breakfast buffet Tony always had delivered. Darcy usually didn’t eat with them, but she’d said she would be there in the morning. He could do this.

He hoped Tony wouldn’t find out it was Steve that bruised her face.

 

Of course Tony knew that Steve was the one who’d bruised Darcy’s face.

“Cap! You lady-killer you, never pegged you for the kind to give a woman a black eye,” was Tony’s greeting when he entered the kitchen/dining room the next day.

“Good morning Tony,” Steve said, clenching his fists. He searched for Darcy and winced. “Again, Darcy, I am so, so sorry.” The ice hadn’t helped much, if the shiner she was sporting was anything to go by. God, maybe he should wait for that to fade before he made his move.

No. No, he’d promised himself today would be the day. No more excuses, no more delays. He wanted to date Darcy Lewis, and he couldn’t do that until he stopped being a little punk and asked her.

He just wouldn’t do it in front of Tony. He wasn’t a masochist.

Breakfast was excruciating. Tony was relentless, and Steve wished he’d waited to seek Darcy out when she was in the lab, where only Jane would be witness to his embarrassment. Even Darcy herself, as good natured as she was, snapped at Tony a couple of times to just shut up, already, Tony, god, you’re like a fourth grader. Iron Man, graduate of MIT, inventor of many impressive things that only sometimes exploded, took exception to this and insisted he had the maturity of at least a seventh grader.

At last the meal starting winding down, and Steve figured he was already getting mocked, so no excuse for cowardice today. He stood when Darcy rose and offered to walk her down to the lab.

“Uh, sure,” she agreed, blushing everywhere her skin wasn’t bruised.

Steve’s pulse was pounding in his ear so loudly he barely even registered Tony’s catcall and the other teasing that followed them out of the room. Apparently, while they had been pretty blind themselves, everyone else had noticed their mutual pining.

His hands hadn’t been this sweaty since he’d gotten the serum. He wiped them on his thighs in the elevator, realized he did that a lot around Darcy, and shoved them into his pockets. He made sure she was well out of range before opening the lab door for her, followed her inside, and shoved his hands back into his pockets before he could wipe them on his jeans again.

“Um, Darcy,” he began, waiting until she was done setting down her things and facing him expectantly to continue, “I am really sorry, again, about last night.”

She waved a hand as if to bat aside his apology. “It’s okay, Steve, really,” she said.

He nodded. “Thanks. I, uh, I wasn’t just down here last night to thank you for the cake. I mean, I loved the cake. It’s just…that’s just it. I loved the cake, Darcy, and it was so thoughtful of you. And you’re just – you just DO those things for people, because you’re a kind, thoughtful person, and you’re gorgeous and patient and intelligent and I’m crazy about you and I was hoping maybe you’d agree to go out with me?”

Darcy was staring at him with one wide eye – he thought probably both her eyes would be wide with surprise if he hadn’t hit her in the face yesterday, but she looked shocked, and he was hoping that soon it would turn into a pleased sort of stunned that led to an acceptance, but instead she just continued staring for long minutes that felt like sandpaper against his nerves.

“Please say something,” he finally begged.

“I think I just had a hallucination,” she replied immediately.

At that, Steve grinned. That sounded like the Darcy he barely knew and yet loved. “Not the ‘yes, Steve, I’ll go on a date with you,’ I was hoping for, but at least I didn’t give you a concussion to go with that shiner,” he told her.

Her laugh was breathless in response. “Yes, Steve,” she said, finally smiling up at him. “I would love to go on a date with you.”

And then she placed her hands on his shoulders and drew herself up and kissed him.


End file.
